kortopates

At $3K for the kit plus 60 hrs for labor with additional for sealing off the speed brakes area I imagine you'll be looking at north of $8K - depending on shop rates. If your existing sealant in your main tanks now isn't in good shape that could also be a significant added cost. As one that has them, be sure to consider the downsides before you commit. They came on my 252 but I would not recommend them. On the plus side, they have proven helpful when wanting to fly long legs such as half way across the country, or from Socal to Cabo and sometimes just being able to add an extra 10 gals above normal full when flying in Mexico where alternates can easily be over an hour away has been helpful. But that is very seldom (for me) and quite frankly I can only fill up the long range tanks if I am flying solo. Even with my supermodel wife and co-pilot, we'll be over gross if we're both going with more than full mains. I really don't relish 6+ hour legs anyway, nor peeing in bottle, and I rarely go anywhere alone where I could use them even if I wanted too. Run your WT&Bal numbers, but I bet you'll find the majority of their utility is limited to a solo flying pilot - which may well hold appeal to you. There are some additional more suttle downsides to consider. With a fuel analyzer or JPI EDM like I have, you'll be able to accurately know how much total fuel you have on board but never exactly what you have on each side. It will be forever challenging to accurately tell how much fuel you have left in your tanks except right after you filled the mains to "Full" - and that comes with a caveat. You will no longer be able to just fill or top off a main tank and know pricesly what you have unless you wait till you have less than 15-18 gals on a side, or you'll still have some unknown amount of fuel in the long range tank adding to your main "full" volume (since fuel added to the main tanks will drain into LR tanks, with the LR tanks not becoming entirely dry till you are below 15-18 gals on a side). More often you'll be putting in a meaured number of gallons based on your "fuel calculations" tracking gals remaining per side - unless you do most of your flying solo. Because of these, we are very careful wth our fuel calculations as I am sure you will be too if you go this route. I also use a dip-stick on the LR tanks for a rough measurement, but of course your fuel gauges only indicate whats in your mains - and thus will tend to show less than what yo uhave till the LR tanks are empty. Lastly, it could be a long time off, but in addition to your initial cost to install them consider the eventual much costlier reseal cost down the road if the added utility will be worth the cost to you along with the loss in simplicity in avoiding overfilling your tanks when your intention is to just fill the Main.

The prelim report is finally out yet it is very brief and provides very little info – after the usual FAA boilerplate about .. “and no flight plan had been filed” it states: “The CFI stated that they had just completed two simulated short-field takeoffs and decided to perform a simulated soft-field takeoff. The student pilot was at the controls during the takeoff roll, and as the airplane rotated, the nose lifted at an angle that the CFI determined was excessive. He verbally coached the pilot to lower the nose, but the nose did not lower. He again requested that the he lower the nose, but there was no response. The airplane then began to drift to the left, so the CFI took the controls and attempted to lower the nose. Before the angle of attack was corrected, the right wing dropped. The CFI responded with rudder input, which was followed by an opposite wing drop. The airplane then landed hard and skidded off the runway on its belly; the CFI reported that fire simultaneously erupted as the airplane slid to a stop.” Says nothing though regarding them doing touch and goes as the press reported, nor if the landing gear was retracted, or what position the flaps were in and if the excessive angle of attitude that the CFI reported was exacerbated by the plane still being in full nose up from the landing etc. Although the remark “skidded off the runway on its belly” sure seems to suggest the gear was retracted and therefore the “hard landing” with a wing dropped could explain compromising a wing tank and a subsequent fire from the sparks of skidding off the runway. But we’ll have to wait for the full report to get all the facts. I was out instructing soft field take-off (and balked landing while in the flare) just last weekend and I can’t think another maneuver that has me guarding the controls closer; especially while the pilot is learning to get the feel of the airplane to hold the nose off. Way to much excitement to be doing that on the go of a touch and go – at least for me. Very unfortunate, I hope both of them come out okay from this. The report is at http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/brief.asp?ev_id=20101211X85133&key=1

I've enjoyed monitoring the site, but haven't posted till now and thought I would add my two cents to this thread. Jason spelled it out very well that updating avionics DB is "maintenance" and showed the requirements by which "all" maintenance must be logged. Danb35 explained exactly why the the units expiration date does not qualify as a maintenance record spelled out in 43.9 which requires 3 to 4 pieces of information in the maintenance record and the expiration date of the database is not one of them. Complain all you want about the silliness of this but its clearly spelled out and its so very simple to properly log all your database updates in your VOR Test log. That's what I've been doing with the 3 databases I have, including my Jepp charts DB which is updated every 14 days. Although a pain perhaps, not a big deal.